Following current, common practice, installation in a building of elevator hall sliding doors, which may be center or side opening doors, begins with the installation of the drive in the machine room, which may be on the top, side or bottom of the shaft. Then the elevator guide rails are installed by using a template, which is temporarily placed in the shaft, to align the rails relative to the drive. Using the elevator rails and another template, the hall door, on each floor or landing, is installed by aligning it with location marks on the template. The template establishes the proper position between the hall door and the rail. The proper relationship between the hall doors and the elevator car, which is subsequently assembled in the hoistway, is thus achieved. Of course, it is possible to assemble the elevator car prior to the installation of the hall doors and then install and align the hall doors by positioning the elevator car at each floor, a more expensive and complex procedure.
It should be observed that the conventional type of installation procedure may only be used in a fully completed building, one in which the floors are substantially in final form and the machine room is available for the installation of the drive. This can have an economic impact in that the building can not be partially occupied. In many constuction projects, partial use of the building on the lower floors is possible, and it is often desired to accelerate building occupancy, to reduce construction costs. But to achieve that, the shaft opening, the path between the floor and the shaft, must be closed off, and while this can be done roughly, it is better if the actual elevator hall doors are installed in the final finished position (correctly aligned for the car door drive and coupling) so that the hallway can be finished.
Among the objects of the present invention is to provide an inexpensive, simple and reliable way to install the elevator hall doors during the early construction of the building. A concomitant object is to make it possible to install the elevator hall doors in their final position during the construction of the elevator system, to permit early occupancy of at least a portion of the building. Furthermore, to the extent that it can be possible to install the elevator drive but not all of the rails, an object of the present invention is to permit the installation of the elevator car and the hall doors during the construction of an elevator building so that at least some of the floors, those that are finished, may be reached with the elevator car.